An Orson Welles Treasure Trove, Made Available By His Daughter For Auction, Almost 30 Years After His Death

More than 70 lots of Orson Welles material, spanning his career, consigned by his daughter Beatrice Welles, April 26 at Heritage Auctions in New York; including Welles' own typewriter, movie camera, humidor, and scripts and script pages from Citizen Kane, the Magnificent Ambersons and much more

For Beatrice Welles, the daughter of the director and actress Paola Mori, putting the material up for auction represents a chance to open up the archives for fans of Orson Welles worldwide, giving them a chance to have something closely related to the great filmmaker, as well as a chance for her to re-connect with her father.

"These things were all in trunks in my parent's house and garage after they both passed away," said Welles. "After they died, I couldn't stand to look at anything having to do with them — I was so close to them both. They were everything to me — and much of the stuff was just sitting on top of these two tables (Orson Welles) used as a desk. I said to a friend one day, 'I can't look at these things anymore. I also felt very much, that I was intruding into their private lives."

That friend gathered the material in the house, went through the trunks in the garage, and put most of it away.

"All of these things came with me wherever I moved to," said Welles. "I finally decided to get a storage unit."

That storage unit is where much of the material has lived until late 2012, when Welles finally went back and started to sort through it. What emerged is an incredible grouping that reflects just as much on Welles as a pioneering filmmaker as it does on him as a man and a father.

"When I finally went and opened the trunk and started looking I realized that this is a treasure trove that I didn't even know existed," added Welles. "There were many things in there that I realized I needed to bring home — private letters, scripts, things he had from when he was a child, like essays from the ages of 10, 11 and 12. Those things I'm keeping. The rest of it, though, I realized would mean so much to someone else."

Welles related that her father was not a materialistic man in any way, and that the fact that this trove exists is truly remarkable.

"He was so prolific," she said, "always working on four or five different things at once. He was also a gypsy and he didn't believe in keeping anything. It's really extraordinary that there is anything like this that exists."

For collectors of Hollywood history and film memorabilia, there is already a buzz being generated.

"This is not a chance that is going to come along again anytime soon," said Margaret Barrett, Heritage's Director of Entertainment Auctions. "Orson Welles is a Hollywood legend. His work continues to influence directors, writers and actors of all genres. This is an opportunity for many film lovers to have a piece of cinema royalty."